Are you losing your house?
As a matter of fact, yes, I WAS losing my house. I was out of a real job for nearly three years and in that time, we fell very behind in our payments and I had no other choice but for me to file Chapter 13 to keep us from losing everything. I'm still in the Chapter 13 and am very thankful that my family is whole and we still have our home.
Are you not covered by health insurance?
I AM covered by my wife's insurance plan which is pretty outstanding since she works for the state of TN. I could get health insurance through my employer but, for the money they want me to pay for it, the coverage would be terrible. Their plan here is pretty poor. My wife's plan is outstanding anyway.
However, my mother is NOT INSURED. Right now, she is working with a local clinic in dealing with her perpetual back problems. She has always had trouble with her back and had surgery three years ago (when she was insured) in order to correct the problem but has recently been incapacitated with more of the same. (Two ruptured disks) In a just world, she could just go to her doctor and they would schedule her for more surgery but instead she is now taking medication to manage the pain till she can get in to get a free nerve block and then there is a two month wait to get in to talk to the surgeon and when they could schedule any possible surgery since she is elderly, unemployed and not on disability of any kind.
Now, some on the right would like to point to her situation as the way things would be in a universal health care system. I disagree. I am quite certain that she would be able to get the nerve block nearly instantaneously but we might as well be talking about how things would be in NeverNeverLand right now.
As it stands right now, I fear that my mother is in serious danger of having to sell her own house in order to pay for her surgery or worse, lose her house because she can't get out and do her jobs to make some money.
This is how that "we" you were asking about are living.
Who is this we you are talking about?
"We" are a lot of Americans in this country who are living with hard times. "We" are the Americans who are losing money because we have to miss work to take our kids to have a third set of tubes put in his ears because he can't seem to shake these ear infections. Sure, it was only two hours but that is a tank of gas that gets us to work to make more money to buy gas to get us back to work. Luckily, insurance pays for the whole procedure but there is still those two steps back that negate that one step forward.
"We" are those Americans who are living paycheck to paycheck who get extremely upset over near-accidents because it makes us think of how close we are to ruin should one of us get incapacitated. "We" are the same Americans that have seethed with outrage for the last eight years watching Bush and his cronies invade sovereign nations to steal oil and THEN give it to the oil companies who then have the absolute audacity to then charge US citizens MORE for the gas while posting record profits over record profits.
Just a quick calculation shows that gas expenditures come to about 8% of our household's monthly income. There is no extra left over after the bills are paid.
Do I expect Barack Obama to cut me a check to help out? No, I don't. (Although he has mentioned a $1000 rebate check. OY) However, I do expect him to move this country closer to being like every other freaking industrialized nation in the world and get us some universal health care. That would go a long way towards helping Americans with their money.
I do expect him to push our nation towards alternative energy sources which should lower energy costs for Americans.
I do expect him to bring some sanity back to our nation by dealing with situations wisely rather than violently.
So, yes, I am part of this "we" and I do think that Obama is going to help.
